


Hearth And Home

by herrDoktorat (rikkuni)



Series: The Blacksmith God [3]
Category: Saint Seiya, Saint Seiya - Saintia Shō
Genre: Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-27
Updated: 2017-03-27
Packaged: 2018-10-11 15:28:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10468215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rikkuni/pseuds/herrDoktorat
Summary: Hephaestus meets Athena, and his fate is decided.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is the final chapter. Thank you for waiting.

The boy walked across the temple in small, careful steps, his face a cracked mask, every movement a far cry from his usual demeanor. Kiki had assisted his master and the other Saints many times in the past, but in the chaos that followed her ascension as a goddess, he'd had very few opportunities to speak to Miss Saori, and never inside her own Temple, past every other.

There, on the path underneath her very statue, he was learning how her world really worked in ways that none of the Gold Saints could explain to him. For one, he'd walked past several handmaidens, which he never knew Athena had. The Cosmo she sent forth from her temple was always so lonely, that he thought there couldn't be anyone else up there with her, but maybe that was due to her worries.

Every single handmaiden had bowed to him, their faces betraying no emotions, their Cosmo a peaceful lake under the stars. There had been rumors of female Saints who'd obey and protect only Athena, rather than the Sanctuary or peace on earth, but Kiki had thought them outlandish, even for his standards. Now, though...

The boy sighed. Those thoughts were just distractions from what was to come. There was only one door separating him from Athena now: the door to her quarters. No Saint had ever gone in there.

Well, maybe that wasn't strictly true. The previous Pope had certainly gone in there to murder her, and more recently, there was Seiya, and maybe Miss Shaina too.

Kiki allowed himself a smirk, and with his heart light, opened the door.

Athena was certainly different from Miss Saori. The latter, as the boy had known her, was haughty and stubborn to a fault, hiding her compassion, insecurities and indecisiveness behind anything and everything she could. Kiki had sneaked into her room, once, and felt he'd walked right into a palace.

 _This_ room, by comparison, was bare.

Everything in there was white and untouched. The room might have belonged to Athena, but there was nothing in there that was hers, save for a lone golden statue in the bedstand. Athena herself was sitting in a fancy chair. With her short brown hair swaying in the wind, she looked right at home while simultaneously completely out of place.

Kiki realized he'd been staring at the room for entirely too long, and hurried to Athena, kneeling before his godddess while trying to subdue the inexplicable sadness he suddenly felt inside.

The goddess Athena rose from her chair, high and wise and powerful, and then sat on the spotless marble floor, right in front of him. She lightly brushed her fingers against his cheek, then gently raised his chin, so they could look each other in the eye. That was when he realized.

Miss Saori had always been a goddess.

* * *

As the boy entered her room, the goddess Athena breathed a sigh of relief. This boy, the boy whose arrival she had been dreading, the boy whose Cosmo had made her tremble as he approached, whose flames could burn her sanctuary to the ground... his smile told her that those were not flames meant to burn her, but a warmth to shield her from the rain.

Perhaps the battle against Hades had worn her down, for her to be so guarded against one as loyal to her as that child, and the god he carried within.

"Hephaestus," she said, knowing that the boy would be asleep once he raised his head.

"My sister," said Hephaestus.

Not once since truly awakening to her godhood had Athena experienced so many memories, her countless human lifetimes flashing before her eyes, into a past so distant even the gods themselves referred to it as the Age of Myth, her last battle with an immortal body, but before she could even find the words, the blacksmith god spoke.

"The gods are angry," he said.

"Our father Zeus promised that none would interfere as long as we settled our disputes through our power and our armies," she said, annoyed that she had to once again discuss the fate of the Earth as though it were a big playground.

Hephaestus shared her discomfort. "Yes," he said, his composed expression turning into a bitter smile which Athena almost wished to mimic, "and we all know how good Father is with promises."

Athena closed her eyes for a moment, contemplating the possibilities. The Sanctuary could not possibly stand against the might of Olympus should they decide to wage war, but most likely Zeus would settle for a display of force instead, and were that the case, she could...

"There is more," Hephaestus said, interrupting her thoughts. "Hades being defeated was one thing, but they are also upset that Poseidon helped your Saints."

"The Greatest Eclipse would have ruined his seas, surely that is reason enough to..."

"Not to mention what you did to bring some of them back," he finished, and to this, she had no argument.

"They think Poseidon and I have joined forces to take over Olympus," Athena said, her mouth set in a grim line.

Hephaestus simply nodded.

"Did you come here only to deliver this warning?" she asked.

"I am no messenger, Athena," Hephaestus answered.

Then:

"Do you remember how the first holy war started?"

_The earth sunk as the blood of thousands_

_Tinged red oceans and skies alike_

_Screams were lost in the howling wind_

_As the Sea King watched from his throne_

_Pain that he would know in time_

"Yes," she said, quietly averting her gaze. The memory was clear in his eyes, more vivid than even her mind could make, but he waited for her to say it all the same. "The gods sunk the continent of Mu, out of fear that its people surpass even your abilities as a smith."

"In time, they would have," he declared proudly. "Poseidon has his Cyclopes and Hades had the Hekatonkheires, but none compared to my children."

"Hephaestus..." she started, but he ignored her.

"Mortals that live as gods should be punished," he continued. "That was something Zeus said to me, back then. What those fools truly feared was—"

"I know."

"My children now live and die as birds in a gilded cage," he said, and she winced. "Except for two."

"What do you mean to do?"

"I mean to thank you, my sister."

Hephaestus lowered his gaze as Athena raised hers, sorrow and surprise interwoven.

"Olympus is as you remember," he continued, "a place of false warmth, where we gods discuss how to toy with the lives of mortals, and our own. Were not for your efforts, my children would have been completely destroyed."

Athena considered what to say as she watched the dwindling embers, his fiery hair a hearth more comforting than any she had ever known. Though she could remember all of her lives, the one she led as a goddess was but a distant speck in the cosmos, eons that felt lesser than even a single day as a human. Yet, she remembered Hephaestus. Not fondly, for there was a time he... well, that mattered very little now. The mind is a plaything of the body, she reminded herself, and his body was that of a child, drowning in remembrance of the forgotten. Yes, she remembered Hephaestus, and his people; the decision being made to wipe them out, and his desperate pleas to the contrary; and the pristine marble floor of the Olympus, reflecting her displeased expression and quiet determination, for that was but the beginning.

"What do you mean to do, Hephaestus?" she asked again. More war, more death... this she could see in the future, but not within her brother's fire.

"I mean to stay," he said simply, confirming her suspicions.

"You would do this to a boy?" she asked, her voice pleading, but Hephaestus scoffed.

"Do you not use children as soldiers in your battles?" he asked, and the fire raged within once more. Four Saintias came forth from the shadows, but Athena raised her Cosmo. The budding flame in the clock was extinguished.

"Calm yourself," she commanded, not only Hephaestus but the Sanctuary as a whole.

"The boy wants this," he said.

Athena grimaced.

"Does he have that choice, still?" she asked.

Hephaestus averted his gaze.

Saori Kido bit her lip. There was something different about the fiery Cosmo coming from Kiki, something that arose only when he snapped back at her... or perhaps the real change had come from her own understanding? She didn't know. The thought made her smile, briefly. Once, not knowing would have meant the end. Now, it was just one of the many little things that drove back the voice in the furthest corners of her mind, the one that whispered that she wasn't really human.

Regardless, there was a change.

The raging fire, a searing inferno that she feared would burn everything down, made her once again feel vulnerable, but not because it was so great. Rather, when raising her own Cosmo, she realized that she could extinguish it as easily as the flames of the clock. There was a determined but terrified child underneath it all, this she knew. What she didn't know, not before his little outburst, was that this child both was and wasn't Kiki.

"When you descended to the Sanctuary, you'd already made that choice for him," she said, raising her Cosmo once more. "You took him as your host, and made it there was no way to undo it."

Hephaestus had no response.

Saori signaled her Saintias, who raised their Cosmo in turn.

"You were wrong," she said, and now she was more Saori than Athena. "There is always a way. I will smother your fire with my Cosmo, and make it so you can never return."

The Sanctuary trembled as all twelve flames burned, suddenly and intensely. Rose petals were carried in by the wind. The distant stars seemed to shine brighter. With a flourish of her hand, the golden statue by her bedside became Niké. Saori was ready. Athena was ready. Now, the raging inferno was but candlelight.

"Wait!" he cried as she brought down her staff, her face stone. "Miss Saori, please wait!"

Niké an inch away from his forehead, she stopped. In the Sanctuary, silence.

Kiki was sweating, eyes creased and brows furrowed, mouth quivering and arms wide open as though he was protecting a charge.

"Kiki, you know what he did," she said, almost a warning.

"I know," he said. "I mean, I already knew."

Saori blinked.

"Hephaestus apologized to me, back when he took my body," he explained.

"No matter how benevolent, being host to a god erodes your soul," she said, "There is no way for you to coexist, not permanently."

"There is a way," he insisted, and suddenly Saori found herself facing her own words.

Cautiously, she lowered Niké.

"Miss Saori, he's hurting. There were things he wanted to say to you, but he couldn't. This conversation kinda got away from him, and he's sorry."

Not for the first time, Saori wondered how could one Cosmo be so many things at once. Once his fiery Cosmo seemed insurmountable, but very fragile. Now, she could feel why: eons of emotions, unstable, uncertain, unpredictable. Conflicting, and most of all _human._

"You can talk to him?" she asked, more out of curiosity than any sort of purpose.

"No... well, maybe. I couldn't before, but now I can feel what he's feeling without really trying, so maybe we can talk. A-Anyway, the thing is, there is a way for him to stay inside me without drowning me out."

Kiki called Saori closer to him, and she consented. Then, he whispered:

"That was a pun, 'cause he got the idea from Poseidon."

Saori couldn't help but giggle. Only a little bit, though.

Poseidon. When he helped her during the battle against Hades, she thought she had felt something, and now she could name it: his Cosmo was as though a peaceful lake, rather than a furious ocean. There was something beneath the surface, and that something was the source of his power, but that power didn't comprehensively account for his being, and it would have, previously.

"Poseidon helped out in the end, right? I mean, you probably wondered how he escaped your seal."

(In truth, she hadn't, partly because the gods somehow escaping her seals was almost old news, but also because she was too busy saving the world, and then Seiya.)

"Poseidon chooses his hosts based on a connection he has to them, and when you sealed him back, that connection remained. I think probably his other hosts all died whenever he was sealed, but because that whole thing with him was so complicated this time around, it didn't happen."

"What are you getting at?" she asked, trying to hurry him along. Athena didn't want to hear another word about Poseidon and frankly, neither did Saori.

"Right. I guess the point is, the amphora was leaking. Poseidon was returning to his host, but unlike last time, only his soul. The brunt of his power is still sealed."

"Kiki," she said. Not that she didn't want to listen to him, and she did understand how they might coexist, now, but hearing the ramblings of a little boy was not doing any favors to her increasingly diminished determination to show Hephaestus the door, so to speak. "Hephaestus could have simply reincarnated as a human," she continued, "he didn't need to use you as a host. The burden of a Saint alone is too great for anyone to bear."

Kiki started fidgeting, which meant her words were getting to him. Good. Now she just needed to—

"Hephaestus said he wanted to see us."

The boy suddenly looked very small.

"Miss Saori, you're not like the other Athenas who just stuck seals to everything and carried on."

"How _dare_ —" one of the Saintias interjected, but Saori shot her down with a look.

"I know you want to do the right thing," he continued, "and yeah, I know being a god isn't easy, and that him being here, and being me, will bring a lot of problems, both to me and to you, but... but I feel like this is something no one else can do, and something that _we_ can do. We can handle it. _I_ can handle it. I won't be alone, and he doesn't want to be. The reason he didn't give me a choice was 'cause he thought I'd refuse, and he was scared."

_Athena._

Saori blinked away from from the intense expression Kiki was directing at her, and turned her head towards the faraway Aries Temple. _Mu?_

_My apprentice can be quite stubborn. I know not what you two discuss, but know that I stand by whatever decision comes to him._

Saori closed her eyes. There was no arguing with her Saints, especially not when what she arguing against was exactly what she stood for. Saori understood this, and if Kiki was so committed to it, then...

"Very well," she said, drawing for him a sigh of relief. "I know you two are not in sync yet, so, can you please bring him forth? I want to ask him a question."

Kiki nodded and closed his eyes. Not a moment of hesitation... This boy really was loyal to her. Saori hoped she would never stop being surprised by this sort of thing, never take for granted love and loyalty her Saints displayed.

Eventually, his hair started burning again, and he opened his eyes as Hephaestus.

"What do you mean to do?" she asked, for a third time.

"I mean to stay," he answered. This time, though, there was more: "I mean to slumber deep within his consciousness, to rest and experience life through his eyes, until he and I are one and the same, and my fire home."

Saori smiled, knowing peace would not come to her brother in any other way.

"Very well."


End file.
